The effect of perceptions of illness on the levels of anxiety specific to the surgery of patients planned for open HEART surgery

Although cardiac surgery is a successful interventional technique in cardiovascular care and treatment, it is a stressful and life-threatening experience accompanied by anxiety in many patients. Illness perception is one of the important factors that determine the anxiety levels of patients in the preoperative period. This study was conducted in a descriptive type to investigate the effect of illness perceptions of patients who were planned for open heart surgery on their surgery-specific anxiety levels. The research was carried out in the cardiovascular surgery intensive care unit and cardiovascular surgery service of Ankara Gazi University Health Research and Application Center Gazi Hospital. The data of the study were collected through the Personal Information Form, the Illness Perception Scale, and the Surgery-Specific Anxiety Scale. The sample of the study consisted of 92 patients who met the research criteria. T test, ANOVA test, Pearson Correlation test and Regression test were used to evaluate the data. Patients stated that they mostly experienced fatigue (78.3%) and difficulty in breathing (66.3%) in the illness identity sub-dimension of the illness perception scale. The highest emotional representations item (19.66 ± 4.49) in the views about illness sub-dimension of the illness perception scale and the highest personal attributions item (21.87 ± 5.64) in the possible causes of illness sub-dimension were found. The surgery-specific anxiety scale item total score average of the patients was determined as (28.37 ± 7.46). The patients mostly stated that they would have a lot of pain after the surgery (3.65 ± 1.15) as the reason for their anxiety. According to the results of the regression analysis, the duration (acute/chronic), results and uncontrolled physical factors sub-dimensions of the illness perception scale positively affect the anxiety specific to the surgery in a significant way (beta=0,429; beta=0,178; beta=0,246; p=.05). As a result, it was found that there was a positive and significant relationship between the patients' perceptions of illness and their surgery-specific anxiety levels. In line with these data, it is recommended to determine the patient's perceptions of the illness, surgery-specific anxieties and the relationship between them in the preoperative period, and to plan perioperative patient education accordingly.